The Middle East is a home for many exceptional artists who dream of sharing their talents with the world, and 421 Arts Campus is a place that turns these hopes into a vibrant reality. 421 Arts Campus is an independent arts platform located in Abu Dhabi’s Mina Zayed, which was established in 2015 as a community space hosting galleries, studios and co-working spaces.
Acting as a nurturing hub, 421 Arts Campus’s main role is to create a hospitable environment for the cutting-edge ideas of rising talents in the UAE and throughout the Middle East who seek to spread social messages and transformative thoughts. Moreover, the platform sheds light on the importance of utilising public spaces as a means for development and community participation based on the concept of artistic exchange.
Their approach is based on presenting an enriching year-round program that includes exhibitions, special events and educational initiatives, providing a unique chance to explore learning opportunities and share artistic insights with the general public. This innovative ecosystem invests in artists, educators, students and even children who want to pursue their passion. This year will be really special for 421 Arts Campus, as the Spring 2024 exhibition is currently underway, while the summer program has only just begun.
The exhibition includes a series of workshops, talks and two major exhibitions to discuss interesting topics such as the rise of artificial intelligence, the effects of climate change, and how to revolutionise our worldview. The director of 421 Arts Campus, Faisal Al Hassan, elaborated, “Both exhibitions provide a novel presentation of the idea of time passage while supporting rising artists and providing them with the means to share their works with the world.”
Available from May 16 until August 25, the solo exhibition by artist Mona Ayyash consists of a collaborative video featuring a number of actors and dancers, focusing on small body movements. The exhibition’s title, “The Clock Doesn’t Care,” describes time as an independent element that will continue to move forward without any consideration given to individual pursuits. These movements are repetitive and non-functional, as they hold no specific purpose, which questions the discrepancies between passing time and wasting time. The artist’s collaborators filmed themselves reacting to movement prompts to visualise what “doing nothing” looks like.
Afterwards, Ayyash carefully selected fragments from the footage and compiled them to be placed in the form of layers over each other or side-by-side in a manner that keeps on changing through accumulation and subtraction. The movements form a loop that keeps on going nowhere under the umbrella of everyday life. These organised repetitions are meant to expand time and highlight the idea clearly and thoroughly.
However, the appeal of this concept is that it doesn’t have a clear narrative to grab the viewer’s attention but rather acts as an entertaining inquiry into understanding the true nature of time. Moreover, Ayyash doesn’t believe in the notion of stimulation and encourages the viewers to embrace boredom through the presented slowness.
The second exhibition is all about the younger generations. Entitled “On a Timeline: 2024 MFA Graduate Show,” it presents the work of graduate students doing their Master of Fine Arts degree in the Art and Media faculty at New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD). The works extensively represent questions and ideas that stem from the current modern world to raise awareness and provide insights into particular issues. The young artists who will have their art pieces displayed are Sara Alahbabi, Ciel Arbour-Boehme, Zara Mahmood, Fatima Al Romaithi and Farah Soltani. Their wild explorations dive into different angles of human conscious perceptions, which are displayed in the form of drawing, painting, sculpture, installation and mixed media.
Alahbabi is interested in landscapes as she provides a unique insight into the neighbourhoods of Abu Dhabi, specifically the streets and alleys of Al Khalidiya. She dives into common stereotypes of the cityscape and the experience of an Emirati woman exploring these diverse spots. On the other hand, Arbour-Boehme’s works are all about navigating spatiotemporal disjunctions. The rising artist focuses on disruption in a space that features corridors, surveillance screens and eerie surfaces where spectators have to respond intuitively to each one.
Al Romaithi takes a unique historical approach by focusing on the nostalgic cultural aspects of the United Arab Emirates and displaying an engaging study of treats and candies that go all the way back to the 1990s. Going green is also discussed in this program, as Mahmood’s work is all about climate change. The visionary artist’s projects capture the contradiction between Dubai’s hazy sky and the reality of pollution in the city’s air.
In other words, the project represents both the materiality of the sky and the phenomena taking place beyond the scope of vision. He displays his ideas using observational drawings and photo transfers on handmade leaf paper. Finally, the talented artist Soltani bases her work on everyday concepts that can be represented in sculptural forms. Each of her pieces embodies a particular identity, which goes into dialogue with the surrounding space based on its position and location.
Furthermore, 421 Arts Campus is committed to supporting emerging creative practices, as it has announced the Summer 2024: Compositions program, which will run from July 8 to September 26. The program will include two current major exhibitions as well as more than ten workshops and special events aimed at promoting a space for writers in Abu Dhabi and the UAE.
Artists have the right to dream and pursue their passions in an environment that supports their vision and accepts them as individuals. 421 Arts Campus is that dreamland where there is a place for every talented artist who has an idea to share with the world. So, if you are an art enthusiast who wants to explore something different or an artist who is looking for inspiration, 421 Arts Campus is the right place for you. They have touched the lives of many people so far through innovative contemporary pieces, and we can’t wait to see what the future holds for this creativity hub.